Beef Tenderloin Steaks with an Easy Japanese-Inspired Pan Sauce

For Thanksgiving this year, I made my very first beef Wellington for our small little gathering. My uncle (who works in restaurants) has been making beef Wellington for years at our Christmas dinners, and I thought why not try it myself for a big holiday that we (sadly 🙁 ) have to spend without our massive extended family? So, I tried it out and not to toot my own horn, but I absolutely nailed it.

The only thing that didn’t really work out was that I wayyyyyy overestimated the amount of meat I would need to feed only five people. Turns out, 4.5 lbs was WAY too much meat, and when you make beef tenderloin, you only need the Chateaubriand cut from the center of the tenderloin, and you don’t need the whole tenderloin. You have to trim the tails off. Needless to say, I was left with a lot of beef tenderloin meat leftovers and I was determined to cook with every oz. of it after Thanksgiving. Beef tenderloin roasts are expensive! You want to make sure you eat it all at all costs. Speaking of beef tenderloin roasts, check out my simple beef tenderloin roast recipe below and tutorial on how to get it absolutely perfect. 🙂

How-To: Beef Tenderloin Roast 

Anyway, this recipe stemmed from playing with those leftovers…and wow. I surprised myself with this one! This was a creation that stemmed from a lazy day off, where I planned to not worry about remembering a recipe while I was cooking, and instead, just cook. BUT it was so easy and delicious that I had to post it.

Let’s talk about the flavor/subs/swaps, etc. Yes, it’s very obvious at this point that I used beef tenderloin here, lol. You can 10000% make this sauce with  any cut of steak, so long as you prepare it by searing it in a pan. This would be delicious with skirt steak, flank steak or sirloin, to name a few.

I usually like to use ginger when I’m making an Asian-inspired sauce. I was bummed when I realized I didn’t have it in my pantry, but since I didn’t plan to make a recipe, I just rolled with it. I did have mirin (a sweet Japanese rice wine commonly used in cooking,) soy sauce and looooots of garlic. Those are the 3 ingredients that make up this sauce, and it turns out, you don’t even miss the ginger! If you have ginger, feel free to add it, though of course.

 

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A post shared by Skyler Bouchard Oppenheim (@diningwithskyler)

My final note here is that this recipe calls for mirin, which is a sweet rice wine. You can actually sub it for rice vinegar or apple cider and just add a little, tiny bit of honey or agave nectar to bring some sweetness. However, I recommend using mirin if you can! Linking a few options below to get on Amazon. Something else I am loving for searing my steaks lately is this ghee oil which I’ve also linked below!